Red Sports founder wins inaugural Everyday Champions award

Story by Dawn Yip. Photos by Lai Jun Wei.

St Regis, Thursday, February 26, 2009 – Leslie Tan, founder and editor of Red Sports, was named as one of the winners of the first-ever POSB Everyday Champions awards. The awards are the nation’s top accolade honouring sports advocates whose contributions have enlivened Singapore sports and inspired others to a sporting way of life.

The idea for Red Sports came to Leslie when he observed the millions of dollars spent on sponsorship of overseas sports. "What about our sports, our schools, our youth?" he said. "So much happens at the school and national level but we don't get to see, hear or read about it enough. The general sporting public knows more about foreign sports than local sports."

In 2007, Red Sports was born, with the mission of telling the Singapore sports story. "My desire is to bring the passionate, vibrant world of Singapore sports to light. On the site, I hope athletes can find their home on the web, and I hope to fan the flames of a national sporting culture."

In a sign of the traction Red Sports has had, Leslie received multiple nominations from both friends and strangers. He was chosen by a selection panel as a winner in the Individuals Category, together with 14 others. The category recognises "individuals who possess a burning passion and have a love for their sport", according to the Singapore Sports Council.

One of the people who nominated Leslie was Ian Chew, a regular contributor to Red Sports. Asked why he did it, Ian explained, "His vision and commitment to the viability of this website is quite inspiring. And I’ve learnt a lot from him about creating and managing a website well."

Said Laura Reid, another nominator, "Les is one of the unsung heroes of Singapore's sporting community. He is everything a great sports fan should be: a critic, a cheerleader, an advocate and, yes sometimes, a grump—but always a loyalist. He puts his own time and money into getting Singapore's sports stories into the virtual world where everybody can read about them…. Nominating Les was the easiest decision I ever made." 

Leslie found out that he had won the award via an email from the Singapore Sports Council. "I was pleasantly surprised," he said. "This site is a labour of love of many hands – people who believe passionately in the Singapore sports story. I'm grateful for all their support."

"When people ask me who pays for this site, they list the usual suspects – SSC, MCYS, MOE. I tell them, no, it's POSB – my own bank account!" quipped Leslie, in a nod to the title sponsor of the award.

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